What your pet sitter needs on one page

The trip is booked, the sitter is lined up, and the instructions are everywhere. Some are in a text thread from last week. Some went to the group chat. A few were said out loud at the door when you handed over the key, and you are not sure which ones.

Then, from the airport security line, the questions start. How much food is a cup, exactly? Is the cat supposed to go outside? The back door will not lock. Which vet do you use?

You answer them all, standing in a line with your shoes in a bin, and you still miss one. The dog gets the wrong food for two days, or nobody knew the cat hides under the guest bed when strangers come, and the sitter spends an anxious evening thinking she escaped.

None of this is the sitter’s fault, and it is not yours either. The information was there. It was in eleven places instead of one.

One page, on the fridge, in the same order every time

The whole system is a single page, kept on the fridge in a clear sleeve, written in a fixed order so a sitter can find any answer in seconds.

One page is a hard limit, and it is a useful one. It forces you to write what matters and leave out the paragraphs. A sitter who arrives with two minutes to spare will read one page. Nobody reads four.

The fridge is the right place because it is in the kitchen, where the food and the bowls are, and because it is the first place anyone looks for instructions in a house.

Emergency information comes first

The top of the page is for the worst case, because that is when nobody has time to scroll.

• Your phone number, and a backup person who is local and can come over if something goes wrong.
• Your vet, with the practice name, phone number and address, and the nearest after-hours emergency vet.
• What you have authorized. Whether the sitter can take an animal to the vet without reaching you first, and that you will cover the bill. Tell the vet’s office in advance that someone else may bring your pet in.

If the sitter reads nothing else, they can still get help.

Then the animals themselves

A short block for each animal, so a sitter who has not met them can tell them apart and describe them if one goes missing.

Name, a line of description such as size, color and markings, the microchip number if there is one, and one clear photo printed on the page or taped beside it. A photo is the fastest way to help a neighbor recognize a dog that got out.

Add any behavior a stranger should know about. The cat that hides under the guest bed for a day. The dog that slips out the front door at the first chance. The one that guards its food bowl.

The daily routine, in the order it happens

Write the day as a sequence, morning to evening, because that is how the sitter will live it.

Morning feeding: what, how much, and where. Walks: how long, which leash, which harness, and any dogs to avoid on the street. Litter: where it is and where the used litter goes. Evening feeding. What the animals do at night, and which lights to leave on.

Be exact about amounts. “One scoop” means nothing unless the scoop lives in the food bin. “A cup” means something different to everybody. The most reliable instruction is the one that cannot be misread, so keep a scoop in the food container and write how many scoops.

If any animal takes medication, copy the directions exactly as they appear on the label, with the time it is given and how, such as hidden in food. Do not paraphrase. The label is the instruction.

The house, briefly

The last block is for the house, kept to what a sitter actually needs.

How to get in, and where the spare key is. The alarm, if there is one. The door that sticks, and the trick to locking it. Where the extra food, litter, bags and paper towels are. Trash and recycling days. The thermostat setting you want kept.

Leave out anything they will not need. A page that tries to cover the whole house is a page that hides the feeding instructions.

Hand over the key without handing over the key

Arranging a key handover in the middle of trip packing is its own small project, and it is the part that goes wrong at the last minute.

A combination lockbox solves it. The key goes in the box, the box stays at the house, and the sitter gets the code by text. It also covers the day the sitter’s plans change and someone else has to come, because you send a code instead of finding a way to get a key across town.

What to actually buy

You can write the page tonight on any sheet of paper and put it on the fridge with a magnet. That is most of the system.

These pieces make the page survive and the handover painless.

The one that protects the page. A home thermal laminator turns the page into something that survives wet hands, food bowls and a dog’s nose. It earns its counter space well beyond this page, for the medication list, the chore chart and the emergency numbers.

The one that keeps it on the fridge. Magnetic pocket sleeves hold the full page on the fridge door. When something changes, the page slides out and a new one slides in, with nothing to peel off and nothing taped.

The one that solves the key. A portable combination key lockbox that hangs on a doorknob or a railing and holds a few keys. You set your own code and change it after each trip.

The one that settles “how much”. An airtight pet food container that holds the current bag of food, with the scoop living inside it. When the instruction says two scoops, there is only one scoop it can mean.

Before the next trip

The page is written once and reused, so do not start from scratch each time.

After each trip, ask the sitter one question: what did you have to text me about? Whatever the answer is goes on the page before it is filed. Within two or three trips the page answers everything, and the airport questions stop.

Keep the master copy on your computer, so updating it is a matter of editing two lines and printing it again. Before each trip, check three things only: your phone number, the vet, and any medication. Those are the lines that cause harm when they are wrong.

Who this is not for

• If you board your pets at a facility, they will have their own intake forms, and those forms are the document that matters.
• If the person caring for your pets lives with you and already knows the routine, one page is more structure than you need.
• If an animal’s care involves complex medical needs, a page on the fridge is a reminder, not a briefing. Walk the sitter through it in person, ideally with your vet’s written instructions.

Start on any Monday

Tonight, take a sheet of paper and write three lines at the top: your number, a local backup, and your vet.

Put it on the fridge.

That is the most important third of the page, and it is already done. The routine and the house can fill in the rest of the sheet before your next trip.